


Two Halves Of My Rainbow

by Waffle-o (XylB)



Series: Two Halves Of My Rainbow [1]
Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: FAHC, GTA Universe, M/M, Multi, Soulmate AU, this is your fault, you know who you are
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-04
Updated: 2018-11-12
Packaged: 2019-03-13 10:54:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 18,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13569102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XylB/pseuds/Waffle-o
Summary: Based off ofthispost andthisfollow-up.And yes, yes, this is the 'FBI agent watching you' soulmate AU this fandom didn't need or deserve but now has.





	1. Chapter 1

Ryan rolls over to slap his blaring alarm off, glaring uselessly at the grey blinking numbers as he tries to will himself out of bed. The minute ticks over to one past six and he shoves the blankets off him to get ready, half-heartedly dragging the covers up afterwards in a poor attempt to somewhat make his bed, as if there’s anyone around to comment on his lifestyle.

The grey closet offers the same boring array of monochrome suits, black jackets and white shirts and various shades of grey ties – Ryan knows the one at the end is a horrendous yellow, and avoids it in favour of a black one a few hangers over.

Once dressed, he makes his way out to the kitchen and goes through his routine on autopilot – turning on the coffee machine, opening the cupboards, bowls and spoons and boxes and plastic and boring boring boring boring.

Muted sunlight spills over the kitchen counter while he gets his breakfast together, the weak strains of early dawn a softer grey that illuminates the edges of Ryan’s coffee machine and reflects gently off the ring on his left hand

The coffee is black like always, the cereal is a weird shade of dark grey, and Ryan’s keys are as silver as moonlight when he plucks them out of the bowl on his way out.

\-- 

“Hey, Ryan,” Geoff says, jovially clapping Ryan on the shoulder when they walk into the imposing building. “How was your weekend?”

“It was good,” Ryan says, raking a hand through his hair. “Yours?”

“Yeah, y’know, was stuck downtown all day with the PD.”

“More drug rings?”

“More like idiot rings. You’d think they’d know by now that you don’t keep your stash in your _sock_ drawer.” Geoff rolls his eyes and Ryan laughs, nodding politely at a secretary as they pass.

“Really? Where do you keep yours?” He jokes.

“Up your ass,” Geoff jokes right back, halting in front of the lifts. He scratches his chin and adjusts the files tucked under his other arm, papers peeking out of the sides.

“New assignment?” Ryan asks.

“Old paperwork.”

Ryan hums in agreement, rocking a little on his heels while they wait. The lift arrives a couple of minutes later, beeping gently as the doors slide open to release its passengers. A lady hurries into the building just as Ryan and Geoff step in, rushing forward on her heels in a beeline to the lift – Ryan leans out and catches the doors with his hand before they can close, shifting out the way so she can bustle in, panting hard as she thanks him.

“No problem. Where you going?” Ryan asks, his thumb hovering over the buttons.

“Manager’s,” she replies, and when Ryan hesitates - “Oh, sorry, it’s the green button.”

As she fiddles with her jacket, Ryan still hesitates, his fingers nervously drifting up an inch -

“Top one,” Geoff whispers behind him, and Ryan smoothly presses the button at the very top, a blank grey one with no numbers on it.

“Where are you going?” The lady asks, looking up at him again with a bright smile.

“Peasants’,” Ryan replies, pushing the fourth floor and chuckling at her loud laugh.

“Do I recognise you?” Geoff asks, cocking his head.

“Oh, no, I’m from a different department,” the lady replies, tucking her hands in her trouser pockets. “My husband works here, though – Michael? Michael Jones?”

“Oh, Michael! Yeah, he’s shown me a picture of you,” Geoff says. “Lindsay, right? You’ve changed your hair.”

“I do that a lot,” she laughs, glancing between them. “And you are?”

“I’m Geoff. Geoff R - “

“Ramsey!” Lindsay exclaims. “Yeah, he’s told me all about you!”

“Good things, I hope,” Ryan mutters.

“Mostly,” Lindsay says. She turns her gaze to Ryan, raising an expectant eyebrow.

“Oh, uh, I’m – Ryan,” Ryan stammers, swallowing down his nerves when her gaze flickers down to his left hand. “Haywood?”

“You’re the guy who worked on the Nublesky case, right?” Lindsay asks. “Oh, shit, I’ve forgotten my manners – ” she sticks her hand out and Ryan shakes it with a smile, shaking his head a little.

“It’s okay, he’s not Agent Stick-up-his-ass,” Geoff says dryly. “At least not right _now_.”

“Shut up,” Ryan scolds. “And yeah, I was the Nublesky case.”

The lift grinds to a halt and the doors slide open, revealing the expanse of desks and computers that Ryan has to live in for the next eight hours – he sighs internally and gestures weakly to the doors.

“Well, this is our stop,” he says, letting Geoff step out ahead of him. “Nice to meet you, Ms. Jones.”

“Lindsay,” Lindsay says, leaning back against the railing. “It was nice meeting you too, Ryan.”

The doors close on her smiling face and Ryan turns to follow Geoff down the hallway, falling into step with him amongst the quiet sounds of desk work.

“Hey, so you hear about the – ” Ryan’s cut off with a hand on his chest, abruptly halted in his tracks.

“Haywood. My office.” Agent Kelly says, nodding at Geoff to go on before he jerks his head towards his door.

Geoff mouths a _see you later_ and Ryan nods, obediently following his supervisor to his office, the thick wooden door shutting off all the sound outside as Kelly settles into his chair. Ryan sits down on the other side of the desk, lacing his hands politely over his lap.

“How are you, Haywood?” Kelly asks. He glances at Ryan’s ring. “How’s the wife?”

“I’m fine, sir,” Ryan says. Clears his throat and ignores how the ring seems to burn into his skin. “She’s okay,” he lies. He’s never even been married, but it’s a good disguise.

Kelly nods and leans forward to push a file across his desk, fixing Ryan with a look.

“New assignment,” he says. “It’ll take up a little more of your time.”

“Sir?” Ryan asks, leaning to pick up the folder. There’s a grey _Classified_ stamped across what Ryan assumes is standard manila.

“Constant surveillance,” Kelly says. “It’s part of a new programme the government’s unveiling. You’ll be watching someone who’s popped up on our radars, help investigate them.”

“I – sir?”

“It’s not much more than a desk job,” Kelly admits, a kinder tone bleeding into his voice. “But you have good attention to detail and an impeccable knowledge of tech crimes, so I think you’ll be good for this one.”

“Thank you, sir,” Ryan says quietly, clearing his throat as he thumbs the edge of the folder.

“Once you open that, you can’t go back,” Kelly warns. “And you can’t tell anyone any details – not even the target’s name.”

Ryan nods. Bites his lip and glances around the office, at the grey plants, the monochrome bookcase, the paperwork strewn across the wide wooden desk.

“I understand, sir,” he says, and flips open the folder.

\-- 

After instructions on what and when to report back and more briefing on his hours and equipment, Ryan returns to his desk, thankfully tucked into the corner so he doesn’t have to move to a more secret place for this monitoring. He nods at Geoff on his way by and nearly trips on a wire before he reaches his row, carefully making his way past office chairs before collapsing in his own, placing the folder beside the keyboard and leaning forward to hold his head in his hands, hidden by the privacy screens set up on either side of each little workspace.

With his new hours, he’s just glad he lives alone.

Ryan sighs and boots up his computers, frowning at the annoying greyscale of the icons and squinting as he tries to distinguish them from the grey background – probably looks fine to anyone who can see colour, but Ryan hasn’t met his soulmate yet and has no intention to reveal that fact to anyone, hence the wedding ring. Geoff and Jack are the only ones who know otherwise, so it’s not like Ryan can just turn to the person to his right to ask him which icon is the blue one. So instead he stares at the grey text on the grey background on the grey computer that’s always been grey and wishes he brought coffee with him.

The software loads relatively quickly, and it’s not hard to figure out how to set it recording. Ryan pulls up the IP and keypass searcher. The IP lands him in Texas, of all places, and the keypass – 6401 – grants him access to a specific computer. It’s currently in use.

Ryan clicks on the webcam and sits back as he patiently waits for it to load, the dark grey bar inching across the grey space. He plugs in his headphones while he’s at it and settles them over his head, keeping one ear free to hear his surroundings.

The screen pops into existence, solid black for a moment until it flickers away to reveal the person on the other side and –

Ryan jolts in his chair and the first thing he notices is that the grey text on the grey background on the grey computer that’s always been grey is actually a _colour_ , a soft, definite _colour_ that Ryan doesn’t know the name of but he thinks he remembers Geoff calling it _blue_ once.

_Blue_.

_Colour_.

Ryan holds his breath and looks at the person on the webcam – except – except he’s not in full colour. Ryan can tell the top of his hair is dyed a vibrant colour but the sides are greyscale; some colours pop in the background and in Ryan’s environment but it’s not _all_ the colours, not yet.

Still, Ryan leans in curiously to study the target – Jeremy, the file tells him, Jeremy Dooley, from Boston – and his chest goes tight with the sudden realisation that this Jeremy must be – must be Ryan’s _soulmate_ , somehow.

Ryan doesn’t know why the other colours aren’t there but he doesn’t care at the moment, too busy watching Jeremy fiddle with something off-screen – he hasn’t glanced up at the computer yet, his back mostly turned to the camera.

Ryan looks again at the blue text on the grey background of the grey computer. He’s too petrified, all of a sudden, to look beyond his little desk, to see what other colours the office has, whether Geoff’s tattoos are all black and white or if they have a vivacity to them that Ryan’s never seen before, whether or not Lindsay’s hair is as lively and pleasant as the rest of her.

Ryan’s always been told his eyes are blue.

With an urgency he tries to hide, Ryan reaches for his phone and turns on the camera, flips it around to study himself and finds blue where before there had only been mysterious grey. And his hair is coloured now – brown, Jack had once told him, on the slightly lighter side of the scale. So _that’s_ what brown is.

There’s a crushing disappointment lying in wait – Jeremy’s a target, he’s merely an _assignment_ – but Ryan ignores it to focus on all the new life he can see now, maybe only half the colours but still _colour_.

Before he can get too wrapped up in himself, Ryan puts the phone away and looks back at the webcam – Jeremy’s still bent over whatever he’s doing. A door – a _brown_ door – opens behind Jeremy and another person walks in, stopping short in the doorway so Ryan can only see their lower half.

“Jesus Christ, Jeremy, what the hell is your _hair_?!”

“Do you like it?” Jeremy asks with a laugh, glancing up to the person and running a hand over his head.

“It’s _awful_ , Jeremy!”

The person walks into frame and the moment their head appears, more colour bursts out at Ryan, fresh and _new_ and now Ryan can see that the sides of Jeremy’s head are _brightly_ coloured – no idea the name of it, but _bright_ , a certain contrast to the top, and Ryan presses a hand to his mouth as he processes everything, the two guys’ conversation playing faintly in his ears.

“God, Jeremy, that’s – I _know_ you can see colour, Jeremy!”

“Thanks to you.”

“Yeah, and because of _you_ , _I_ can see that monstrosity!”

“You’re welcome!”

_Those two are soulmates_. Ryan sucks in a breath and tries not to let it out too shakily, glancing up at the screen to watch Jeremy scoot over for the other guy to pull up a chair beside him.

“Halo?” Jeremy asks.

“Only if y’want,” the other guy says, leaning forward to grab a controller off the desk.

“I don’t know, you feel like getting your ass kicked today?”

“Oi,” the guy scolds gently.

“Then Halo it is, Gav,” Jeremy teases, dropping a kiss to his cheek before he leans towards the webcam to reach something.

Ryan hears the familiar sound of an Xbox start up and quells the panic building in him, a rush of emotion that came with the colour and he can’t quite identify the colour of the Xbox start up screen in the corner of the frame but it’s a jarring not-grey that almost overwhelms him.

Jeremy doesn’t look like a criminal. He looks like a young guy playing video games with his boyfriend and playfully teasing him when they lose. He looks _innocent_. Ryan knows from experience that looks aren’t everything, but Jeremy is so painfully _genuine_ , in just his interactions and his laughter, that Ryan can’t help but wonder what trumped up charge Kelly’s got him under watch for. Wonders if this _Gav_ is in on whatever it is.

At any rate, they look like no people who have any business being Ryan’s soulmates – because that’s the only rational explanation Ryan can think of, that he has _two_ now, and he wonders – stupidly, _selfishly_ – if there’s some colour missing from Jeremy’s and Gav’s lives, colour that only comes with _him_.

But that hope is slight, and stupid, and terribly selfish, because from the way they laugh and talk and act, Ryan can tell they’ve found the whole rainbow in each other instead.

He’s, at least, a little glad that he knows what that rainbow looks like now.


	2. Chapter 2

Ryan watches them for weeks. Learns a _lot_ about them, both from the webcam and the unobtrusive hacking he occasionally indulges in – but Gavin’s certainly technologically talented, and Ryan doesn’t want to raise any suspicions, so he keeps it simple. Learning passwords, prodding at their firewalls.

Jeremy Dooley and Gavin Free. One from Boston, one from Britain. Don’t seem to do much except play video games and get drunk and fall into bed together – and sometimes they don’t even make it to the bed and Ryan’s left awkwardly watching-not-watching as they get their rocks off. Trying to pretend he’s not interested and failing miserably.

Ryan loses _days_ in the office. Some nights Jeremy’s up until all hours – some nights he’s not even _in_. Geoff comes by to check on Ryan at his desk sometimes, grabs lunch and occasionally dinner for him when Ryan inevitably forgets to take a break. There’s a reason he’s recording it all, after all, and that’s so he _doesn’t_ have to be constantly vigilant, so he can take a few minutes’ break here and there, grab some sleep if he really needs to.

But he can’t help it, he’s entranced by the seemingly mundane lives of his soulmates hundreds of miles away, gripped by the easy way they live with each other, how _well_ they work together, dovetailing seamlessly like a finished puzzle.

Sometimes it makes Ryan a little despondent, that he can tell he’d never fit in with the two people fate says he _should_ fit in with. They’re funny, and good-looking, and affectionate and warm and _happy_ and brighter than Ryan in more ways than just the colour.

But Agent Haywood has a job to do. He keeps an eye on the happenings around Austin, on the minor scandals popping up around the city – Jeremy was flagged for pirating a film, so Ryan’s not _too_ worried about him, but it’s what he’s paid for, so he keeps tabs on both of them.

Jeremy’s a creative – loves art and writing and music and designing – where Gavin is more technical – loves camera work, does slow-mo experiments in his spare time, toys with computers and software and is genuinely smart in a way that shines through in their late-night conversations, when Jeremy’s pressed up to Gavin’s side on the bed and asks him about something and listens to Gavin’s excited chatter about his new project. And some of that joy bleeds through to Ryan, as well, makes him smile to himself at two a.m. in the empty office as he listens to his soulmates create and live and just _exist_ , their laughter brighter than the colour in Jeremy’s hair – _purple_ and _orange_ , Ryan’s learnt – and their easy companionship smoother than their quick banter.

Ryan’s learnt a lot about colours through a few Google searches – learnt ROY G. BIV and all the shades in between, how metallics shine and matte doesn’t, how _bronze_ is different from _brown_ and the exact shade of Geoff’s eyes is somewhere between blue and grey. That his ring is _gold_ , a brilliant, beautiful _gold_ that looks marvellous in the sunlight – the _yellow_ sunlight, that drapes over his coloured kitchen and his coloured furniture and makes everything soft around the edges.

It’s a certain type of invisible joy Ryan never thought he’d have, never _considered_ , and now, stuck at a corner desk of a drab FIB office, _now_ he’s transfixed by all the subtle colours, by the tiny difference between his navy pen and black trousers that he never saw before. By the soft blue glow of the ‘on’ light on the computer and the harsh red on the ringing telephone. By the hair on his own arms.

And so, he loses hours to Gavin and Jeremy, completely and utterly enthralled by their simple lives, by _them_.

And when it’s late and the building’s completely dark save for the lone light above his desk and no one is around to ask questions, he doesn’t have to hide his small, pleased smile at their shenanigans.

\-- 

Ryan turns in his latest report to Kelly and takes a few minutes to grab lunch with Geoff and Jack before returning to his desk, to compiling recordings and filling out plan paperwork for other cases.

“So? How’s this mysterious new assignment going?” Geoff asks, poking at his curry with a fork.

“It’s okay,” Ryan says with a shrug. He sips his Diet Coke and sets it down on the bench between them to unwrap his salad.

He hasn’t told Geoff he can see colours yet. Doesn’t know _how_ to – _what, you met them?_ Geoff’ll ask, and Ryan doesn’t know how to explain it yet. He can’t talk about his assignment. But Geoff knows better than anyone when Ryan’s lying, and he couldn’t successfully just pass it off as someone he met in _person_ , because then there’s – _are you dating them? Hanging out with them? Damn_ _it_ _, Ryan, are you doing_ anything _with them yet?_ \- and it’s just better to keep it all a secret for now, as much as it pains him to to not be able to tell his friends that he knows what colour the outside of the building is now.

“How’s Michael?” Ryan asks in return. “Heard you two got paired with the PD.”

“Yeah,” Geoff sighs. “Crew-bustin’ again. Shouldn’t be too hard.”

Ryan ‘hm’s in acknowledgement and a beat of pleasant silence passes between them.

“When’s the last time you went home?” Geoff asks, turning his gaze to Ryan.

“Yesterday,” Ryan lies.

“Ryan.”

“What?”

“You’re sleeping in your car,” Geoff says in a strange, knowing way of his, his eyes flicking over Ryan’s face.

“I was busy,” Ryan says, averting his eyes to pierce some lettuce on a fork.

“Jesus Christ, what has Kelly got you doing?”

“It’s fine,” Ryan insists. “Just – long hours.”

“Yeah, I can fuckin’ tell. I haven’t seen you out of the office in a week, Ryan.”

Ryan winces at that reminder – he’s been home a few times this week, slept over in his car the past two nights, but other than that he hasn’t left the office or his house for anything other than commuting to the other.

“It’s important,” Ryan mutters, but he doesn’t say to whom. He’s sure Jeremy Dooley is low on Kelly’s priority list. Geoff sighs heavily and pats Ryan’s shoulder.

“I know, buddy,” he says. “Just – take care of yourself, okay? The agency doesn’t want you run into the ground on this.”

“Yeah,” Ryan agrees half-heartedly. “I’ll try.”

\-- 

Ryan really does intend to go home after this watch – he glances up at the screen and finds Gavin and Jeremy getting ready for bed, shuffling in and out of the room and lazily undressing and trading slow kisses. There’s some bandages around Gavin’s wrist that Ryan has no explanation for, but from the previous weeks, he’s gathered that Gavin’s a clumsy sort, often bandaged or bruised somewhere from something, so Ryan doesn’t dwell on it too much. There’s not enough light for him to make out their faces, but their voices are low and familiar, mixed in with laughter like always. It’s a normal night in the Free-Dooley household, it seems, and Ryan’s just waiting for them to turn the computer off and go to bed so he can also go to bed.

On the other monitor, he emails Jack a copy of a search warrant for the Martin case and then gets back to his idle browsing, checking the news around Los Santos and Austin – not in his job description, but he might as well get a feel for the type of illegal antics popping up around Gavin and Jeremy. Completely for business. No personal worry about them at all.

There’s the usual – the drunk driver from two weeks ago taken to court, a high school shut down because of widespread drug use, some good news from medicine research, a local ad for an animal shelter. Ryan clicks out of the small news and goes a little bigger, skims articles about the major tax reforms facing the city, about the serious rise in carjacking around the suburbs, about – oh, this is new.

Ryan opens the article in a new page – _Crime duo singlehandedly hikes up crime rate for the month_ – and reads it to the sounds of Gavin and Jeremy gently bickering over whose toothbrush is whose.

The article raises the interesting point that crime rates have spiked in Austin lately, from a group no one knows, or even has ever _heard_ of. The police statement claims they don’t know how many members the group has, but they’ve been culprits of those carjackings, of a few more minor robberies, and they tag it all, apparently. A gold checkmark beside each crime scene, either spray-painted or Sharpied or, in one memorable case, glitter-glued.

In Ryan’s tired, sleep-deprived brain, it’s a little funny, these two criminals running around checking things off like it’s a to-do. Steal a brand new SUV? Done. Hold up a gas station fifty miles out of town? Done. It’s an almost _childish_ sort of branding that makes a quiet chuckle bubble out of Ryan.

He glances at his watch – 0120. He sighs; Gavin and Jeremy are still fucking around, putting things away and doing god knows what at this hour – it’s almost four a.m. their time, for crying out loud.

Ryan’s at least hoping that this late night means they’ll sleep in tomorrow, and that _Ryan_ will be able to sleep in a little. Unlikely, from what he’s seen before – Jeremy doesn’t often sleep for more than seven hours, whereas Gavin could go all day if Jeremy lets him.

He turns back to the latest police report and scrolls through it with a bored sigh, idly examining the variety of crimes on this mysterious duo’s combined rap sheet. It’s nothing like he sees in LS, at least; seems like Austin crime’s a much tamer beast.

Witnesses don’t have much, either – spotted the two main suspects and all they could give was one’s taller than the other, both male, one with an accent they couldn’t place, saw them hijacking a car on Main St. and leaving their standard checkmark before speeding off. Not much else except a description of their attire, which boils down to hoodie and jeans and beanies for both of them. And a pair of rainbow Converse, oddly enough, on one of them -

And a pair of silver rimmed aviators with a cracked lens –

And one of them crashing into a wall, side-first –

“There’s no way I can fix these, Gav, they’re _shattered_!”

“Well we’ll have to get you a new pair, won’t we? Not that hard to find, are they?”

“But these were from _Boston_.”

“I’m sure we can find something here, J, ‘s not _that_ different.”

Ryan recognises those rainbow Converse. Has footage of them sole-up to the camera as the owner toppled over in their chair –

Ryan hesitantly looks up to the webcam, to the conversation, and sees Gavin cradling his bandaged wrist as Jeremy frowns at a pair of sunglasses sitting on the drawers.

A pair of silver rimmed aviators with a cracked lens. The right lens, specifically, Ryan could say if the police asked him.

 _If the police asked him_. And if the police asked him, Ryan would have to say _how_ he knows and he’d have to say _why_ he knows, and that he knows that they play Mario Party every Saturday and go grocery shopping on Tuesdays and – and – and – and –

The police aren’t going to call him – no _reason_ to call him, no connection except _they’re his assignment_ and how did Jeremy only get flagged for a pirated film when they’ve been hijacking cars and holding up gas stations this entire time and they’re Ryan’s soulmates and _Ryan’s soulmates are criminals_.

Ryan’s breathing is coming _far_ too quickly to be normal and his fingers tremble against the keyboard and _ohshitohshit_ he has to – he should – he has to _report_ this, this is his _job_ , to monitor one Jeremy Dooley and report back on any strange findings and this really is a fucking _strange_ finding, that one Jeremy Dooley and his partner – in love, in life, in _crime_ – one Gavin Free, imported straight from Britain, are the crime duo singlehandedly hiking up crime rate for the month of August and –

Ryan hyperventilates himself into a panic and buries his face in his hands as he hunches over his desk, listening to Gavin’s and Jeremy’s quiet conversation as he struggles to calm down – he’s still recording, _he’s still recording_ – and try to figure out how the _fuck_ this happened and _where_ he missed it and how in the _world_ finding his rainbow fucked him over so _badly_ and now he’s curled over a desk in a drab little office and pretending his eyes aren’t stinging with emotion he doesn’t want to name, doesn’t want to _fucking feel_ , and from it all only one coherent thought surfaces and it’s so _absurd_ that he chokes back a wet laugh at it. 

He’s not getting home tonight, is he.


	3. Chapter 3

Ryan’s startled awake when a crash floods his headphones – it’s two days after his discovery and too much coffee and not enough sleep and god, he hasn’t fallen asleep at his desk since grade school, _get your shit together, Haywood_. The backseat of his car’s been treating him pretty decently, though, and his back doesn’t ache as much as he expected.

He wipes the drool from his mouth and hurriedly clicks over to the webcam screen again to see Gavin and Jeremy hastily opening drawers and bags and – and _packing_ , it looks like, stuffing clothes into duffles and _oh that’s definitely a gun_.

“What about T?” Gavin asks.

“We’ll have to tell him later,” Jeremy says, panic high in his voice. “Fuck, _fuck_ , we’re not gonna make it out of here, god - ”

“Hey, _hey_ ,” Gavin says sharply, pausing to grab Jeremy’s shoulders. “We’ll get out, okay? You know the plan, right?”

Jeremy nods and pulls Gavin in for a quick hug, their panting loud in Ryan’s ears.

“We fucked up, though, Gav, the cops – ”

“It happens, we made a mistake, let’s just bloody _go_ ,” Gavin replies, turning to continue packing.

Ryan’s fingers _fly_ over the keyboard as he brings up Austin news – nothing. Jack shit nothing and he turns to the police database, slips in through the metaphorical backdoor in that technically-illegal way he’s not supposed to do, and through that and scraps of Gavin’s and Jeremy’s conversation, he figures out they’ve been caught. The police know their address, know their _faces_ , there’s already a warrant in play and they are _fucked_ unless they get out of there.

Which is what they’re doing.

Ryan’s torn between staying quiet like he’s technically supposed to and reporting this like he really really _should_ , should storm into Kelly’s office right now – no, no, it’s ten p.m., most of the office is gone already, he remembers – should storm into Kelly’s _house_ and call the Austin PD and give them all the information he has, including –

“Car’s got enough gas, right?”

“Should do.”

“ _Should_?”

“It’s a thousand mile journey, Jeremy, I planned it as best I could!”

“Did you? Or did you fuck it up like last time - ”

“Oh shut up, Jeremy, you _know_ that wasn’t my fault.”

A pause.

“Shit. _Shit_. ‘M sorry, Gav, I didn’t mean it, I’m just – I’m sorry - ”

“It’s okay,” Gavin sighs. He sounds tired. “It’s okay, I understand, let’s just – let’s just go, okay?”

There’s a crack in his voice that makes Ryan’s heart ache.

“...how long’s the trip?”

“Just over a day if we take shifts.”

“Are we stopping on the way?” Jeremy asks. There’s a silence.

“We can rest once we’re in Los Santos,” Gavin says quietly. “I don’t want to chance it before - ”

“Okay. Okay, Gav, that’s fine, I just wanted to know.”

“...thanks.”

“I love you, yeah? I understand.”

Including the fact that Ryan knows they’re headed to Los Santos. To _him_. _Fuck_.

Ryan should _definitely_ report this. Should compile the recording and write it up and email it to all his higher-ups. Make the necessary phone calls. Alert the PD to this. Get a tracker on Gavin and Jeremy, get tails on them. Find their trail and hunt them down. Arrest them. Or worse, if they resist.

And they would resist, _that_ Ryan can safely guess. Jeremy’s not the type to go in silently, Gavin’s not the type to let Jeremy go in by himself.

Ryan tells himself it’s because he doesn’t want to lose the newfound colour in his life if they – if they. If they don’t make it. He doesn’t want to go back to monochrome mornings and greyscale evenings.

That’s what he tells himself.

That’s his weak, _weak_ excuse as he sits there. And watches. And does nothing. Pretends it’s because he wants to know when his tie matches his suit and when his phone’s flashing red.

The laptop is the last thing to get shut and packed away, and the last frame Ryan sees is of Jeremy’s panicked face.

Deleting the footage almost _hurts_.

\-- 

The next 24 hours are the most nerve-wracking of Ryan’s life, tracking Jeremy’s invisible route to Los Santos and trying to figure out where they would be at any point after X hours of driving, after X number of possible rest stops, and he imagines them bickering about the radio and laughing about the other drivers.

He misses their voices.

It’s stupid, he knows, to miss the one-way voices of people he was merely assigned to watch, a permanent outsider to their bright, colourful lives, looking in on a vibrant fishbowl filled with all the shades of blueredpurplegreen that Ryan had been missing his whole life.

No one bothers him except for the worried glance Geoff casts his way.

Ryan just ducks his head and listens to the static.

\-- 

Jeremy and Gavin are in Los Santos. They _have_ to be, it’s been far more than a day, but when Ryan tracks the laptop again he find its coordinates in the Pacific Ocean.

So they’ve dumped the laptop. Unsurprising, really, but Ryan was holding onto a shred of hope that they _wouldn’t_.

Ryan’s damn near vibrating out of his _skin_ where he is, just trapped at his desk and pretending he’s working when in reality he’s panicking. They’re _here_. They’re here and they’ll be another crime statistic added to the mile-long list and Ryan’ll probably be on the team to catch them if they’re bad enough – it’s been a while since Ryan’s been in the field, but he’ll still medically fit enough to be sent out.

Gavin and Jeremy are going to get themselves _killed_ in Los Santos.

Ryan knows this with every fibre of his fucking being. It’s nothing like Austin, Los Santos. It’s skyscrapers and scenic sunsets and beaches and villas – and gritty alleyways and souped-up street races and cocaine deals in backstreet cafés and violent gang attacks in abandoned car parks. It’s nothing like the two-bit petty crime Gavin and Jeremy have been pulling in Austin.

Auto theft? Old news, barely even chased up anymore unless someone complains. Your fault for parking in the wrong spot.

Manslaughter? Just don’t piss off the wrong people.

And knowing Gavin and Jeremy, they’re _going_ to piss off the wrong people.

Ryan doesn’t want to forget the colour of his eyes.

Ryan doesn’t want to unlearn the rainbow.

–- 

It feels strange, not driving to work at six-thirty on a Friday morning, feels stranger to still be in _bed_.

Not that Ryan’s slept much - overactive imagination, overthinking everything, but he pictures his empty desk and thinks determinedly that it’s going to _stay_ empty.

He hasn’t formally resigned, but he’ll do something damn well close to it.

This time he kicks the covers off and doesn’t make the bed. Forgoes his boring array of suits and goes for the jeans and old T-shirt knocking around in the drawers, an old leather jacket an ex bought him. He frowns as he tugs at the shirt hem – he’s gotten softer around the middle in recent months, too much time at a desk and not enough in the field. Pushing those thoughts aside, he rakes a hand through his hair and looks at himself in the mirror. He’s imposing enough, he decides. And for once, the all-black isn’t from necessity, from not being able to match colours, it’s from _choice_.

It feels good. Freeing in a way that scares him a little.

Ryan tugs off the fake wedding ring and leaves it on the bedside table on his way out.

\-- 

Ryan knows enough from being on the other side of the law to know the basics.

1\. Leave no evidence.

2\. _Leave no evidence_.

He pays for the mask with unmarked bills, gets himself a new pair of leather gloves while he’s at it. Fits the mask over his head and the gloves on his hands and feel something settle inside him, a sense of relief that at least he’s not as easily recognisable now.

It’s still too early to go poking around – barely even dusk, and after he’s spent all day securing burner phones and quietly erasing himself from the FIB database, he figures he deserves to grab a meal first.

He’s never had lunch at the pier, he thinks. It sounds like a good memory to make.

\-- 

After dark is when Ryan starts the real work.

He should probably feel worse for just up and quitting his good, steady job, but all he feels is _glad_. Free of the government, free of Kelly, that itch in his palms and on the back of his neck finally allowed to break into _action_ , into the aggression he can use to get his way.

He knows who to go to.

Ryan damn near kicks the door in on Diaz’s shitty little office, lodged between a laundromat and a Chinese takeaway place, to find it completely empty. He growls and glances around – no sign of any unusual disturbance, just as shabby as it’s always looked, simply no sign of Diaz anywhere.

Well. Ryan didn’t come all this way for nothing. He backs into into a corner and brandishes his gun, ready for whenever Diaz _does_ return.

\-- 

Only half an hour later, the door creaks open, and the moment it shuts behind Diaz, Ryan’s on him, yanking his arms behind his back and pressing him face-first into the wall, nudging his pistol against Diaz’s ribs in a threat as he kicks his legs open unsteadily wide.

“ _Je_ sus,” Diaz breathes, his cheek smushed into the door. Ryan growls and clamps his fingers tighter around Diaz’s wrists, grinding the bones together.

“Don’t scream,” Ryan warns. Diaz’s breath hitches and his head turns ever-so-slightly and -

“Ryan?” He asks. Ryan’s heart kicks up in his chest and when he doesn’t answer, Diaz’s head twists more.

“How did you know?” Ryan asks, knows that’s just _giving_ himself away, but he has to know. Diaz laughs pleasantly.

“Oh dude, I remember you!” He says. “Shit man, why you cornerin’ me like this?”

A surge of guilt rises in Ryan and he lets Diaz’s wrists slip out of his grip, stepping back with a sheepish apology.

“Sorry,” he mumbles, tucking the gun away again as Alfredo turns around, slumping against the door. “I – I didn’t know you’d remember me.”

Alfredo studies him for a moment and shrugs, patting him on the shoulder on his way to his desk.

“It’s okay,” he says easily, leaning against the desk and crossing his arms. He frowns at Ryan and Ryan shoves his hands into his jacket pockets to hide his nerves. Fuck, he should’ve gotten body armour.

“You look different,” Alfredo notes. He _winks_. “I like it. Leather suits you.”

Ryan scoffs and Alfredo laughs, cocking his head a touch as he studies Ryan.

“So, what brings you here, Agent Haywood?” He asks. “I know it wasn’t just for my fashion opinion.”

“I need help,” Ryan says.

“Start from the beginning.”

Ryan swallows and looks off to the side, at the small pile of rifles nestled in the corner of Alfredo’s office.

“There isn’t one,” he says. “I just need a jumpstart.”

“A jumpstart? For what?”

“Let’s just say I’m not on the right side of the law anymore,” Ryan says carefully. “That’s all you need to know.”

“You want a reputation.”

“I want another life.”

Alfredo gives him a once-over, his eyes glittering with mischief.

“I think I know where to start.” 


	4. Chapter 4

Ryan’s familiar with guns. From training, from field duty, from the one pistol he owns to the grenade launchers they confiscate from unwieldy crew members, from rat-tat-tat-tat ammo and the thick, heavy _booms_ of rockets, the resulting debris that skitters across the crime scenes.

He’s familiar with cars. From his own, from the FIB ones, from high-speed chases down motorways to road blockades, from cumbersome vans with too much weight on the back wheels and armoured supercars taken away to be stripped for parts, or freed of their extra cocaine baggage.

Ryan’s not _quite_ familiar with being on the wrong side of it all.

And he’s _definitely_ not that familiar with motorbikes.

But Alfredo apparently trusted him enough for this, swinging a leg behind Ryan on the bike and yelling at him to _go_ as sirens whoops behind them and Ryan guns the engine, following a path he knows like the back of his hand, weaving through traffic and it’s not _panic_ building in his throat for once but rather _adrenaline_ , making his skin tingle and his hands sweat in the leather gloves. He can hear Alfredo shooting behind him, the pop and burst of tyres as Alfredo clears their tail – there’s bullets whizzing by them as well, tearing into the road either side of them and ricocheting off of surrounding vehicles, terrifying and thrilling all at once and Ryan can’t help but smile to himself under his helmet.

It wasn’t even a big hit, just a quick pit-stop at Ammu-Nation to liberate them of some extra guns, and here Ryan is, being chased by the same people Geoff and Michael are working with, running for his life and loving it more than he ever thought he would.

He’s clumsy on the turns, oversteering and wobbling a bit but Alfredo doesn’t seem concerned, just holds onto him tighter and whoops when they’re free of the cops, wrapping both his arms around Ryan and his gun knocking against Ryan’s hip.

Ryan is _so_ out of his depth.

He _love_ s it.

\-- 

Ryan learns quickly. Picks up on all the little subtleties and amasses more guns and runs more jobs with Alfredo – simple two-people heists, gas stations and drug deals and the sort of shit that garners him a reputation.

He picks out _Vagabond_ one late night over dinner with Alfredo, hooking sticky noodles around his chopsticks and toying with the cube of chicken as they talk.

And Vagabond he becomes.

Ryan’s killed people before, sure, in the line of duty, but like this it’s almost better – no red tape and no paperwork and nothing but surety when he fires a bullet between the eyes of the guy running the local sex slavery ring the FIB have been trying to break up for _months_ and bam, over. He’ll leave the paperwork to his former colleagues.

He hasn’t heard a fucking word about any new crime duo. He figures Gavin and Jeremy are laying low, but in the meantime Ryan’s plunged himself into a whole new lifestyle and he’s floundering a little, a constant struggle between fight and flee and life and death.

He abandons his house. Leaves a cryptic goodbye at Geoff’s door with apologies for Jack and Michael in there as well and takes up residence in a shitty little flat on the edges of Vespucci and tries not to regret.

The panic creeps in sometimes, when he’s alone and sitting on the flimsy balcony and trying to rationalise – he _can’t_ rationalise – what, he left his stable job and stable income and his _friends_ to go run off and become a criminal in the city he once protected? All because of some stupid fucking _soulmates_ who gave him colour and didn’t even _know_ him? All because of – of –

And that’s the part when Ryan’s brain shuts down and the world is big and scary and _terrifying_ and he buries his face in his hands to muffle himself and the only little shred of hope he can use to remind himself where he is and what he’s doing is that he knows what colour the creeping vines on his balcony railing are.

\-- 

“Ryan?” Alfredo asks while they’re unloading guns in his office, dumping them unceremoniously on the desk and uncaring of the paperwork scattered over the surface.

“Yeah?” Ryan replies distractedly, fixing the precarious position of a few pistols.

“Can you hand me that blue paperclip?”

“Sure.” Without thinking, Ryan reaches for the blue plastic paperclip in the bowl and offers it up – and pauses, and looks up, and sees Alfredo’s eyes narrowed a little, his nose scrunched up as he scrutinises him.

“Lucky guess?” Ryan jokes, but it falls flat.

“I knew there was something different,” Alfredo says. “You’ve met them, haven’t you?”

Ryan carefully declines to answer, swallowing thickly and dropping the paperclip to shove his hands in his jacket pockets.

“When?” Alfredo asks. “Last time I saw you – the Dewsbury bust-up. You were still...”

Ryan still doesn’t answer.

“It’s why you left the agency, isn’t it?” Alfredo continues, softer.

“Thanks for all the help, ‘Fredo,” Ryan says quietly, and turns to go – Alfredo catches him around the arm and Ryan turns his head away, blinking back something he doesn’t want to name. Shame, fear, embarrassment, _regret_. That age-old panic that never fades away no matter _how_ much he does.

“Who are they?” Alfredo asks.

“I...don’t know,” Ryan admits. “I don’t – I don’t know.”

“Why didn’t you tell me - ”

“It’s not important,” Ryan says gruffly, yanking his arm away. Alfredo grunts and claps a hand on his shoulder to hold him back, stepping around to stand beside him.

“I think it’s pretty fucking important, _Agent_ ,” Alfredo spits. “You’re _different_.”

“I’m a _criminal_.”

“Not just like that. I remember working with you before.”

“Alfredo - ”

“Who’s so important you gave up your _life_ for them?”

Ryan – can’t answer that. Doesn’t know how to. Doesn’t even know where the fuck to begin – two idiots playing computer games irresponsibly late, two idiots laughing over some stupid inside joke Ryan wasn’t even _in_ on, two fucking idiots getting themselves hurt and patching each other up, two stupid motherfucking _idiots_ that crawled their stupid way into Ryan’s life and into Ryan’s mind and filled in the rest of the world like a colouring book for him and he thinks somewhat moronically that if he ever met them, the _I love you_ would roll off his tongue easier than the _hello, I’m Ryan, who are you?_ and isn’t _that_ just ridiculous.

“Like I said,” Ryan says, chews up the words and spits them out much harsher than the first time. “ _I don’t know_.”

Alfredo studies him for a moment more and then releases him, stepping back to let Ryan move freely.

“I hope they’re worth it,” he says.

 _I hope so, too_ , Ryan thinks but doesn’t say. Leaves with a gruff _see you tomorrow_ and knocks against the doorframe on the way out.

\-- 

Despite the panic, despite the unknown, despite the residual regret still crawling up Ryan’s spine and sometimes blooming across his consciousness in fitful sleep and trembling fingers, he pushes on. Learns and fights and learns some more, takes hard hits and harder falls – Alfredo’s there to catch him, and he’s there to catch him right back, almost _literally_ most of the time.

And Ryan doesn’t lose his morals. No he fucking doesn’t – he sticks to hurting only those who deserve it, refuses any outside offers that require anything else. Alfredo’s, thankfully, on the same lines as him, tells him what bosses to avoid and what types of deals to decline, who’s good for what and who’s scum of the earth.

Not as many people as Ryan thought, honestly.

But he sticks with Alfredo and he grows in leaps and bounds, and his turns on the bike aren’t so clumsy anymore and he’s a quicker draw on the guns – _much_ quicker on the SMGs now, and pretty decent on sniper rifles thanks to Alfredo’s training.

Right now, during a quiet evening after a busy day, he’s on cleaning duty, leaning against the railing of his shitty little balcony and wiping a rag over his rifle – Alfredo tugs open his fridge inside and signs something – Ryan responds with a quick gesture and Alfredo nods, shooting him a thumbs up before he reaches in.

Alfredo collapses beside Ryan a minute later, cracking open a soda and passing it over as he pops the tab on his own, clinking it with a laugh against Ryan’s before drinking. The sunset stripes over Alfredo’s face in a pleasant glow, softening all his edges and bringing out the gentlest sort of warmth Ryan could only ever imagine just months ago.

“Hey, gimme a taste of that,” Alfredo asks, jerking his chin towards Ryan’s can. Ryan starts to offer it up but Alfredo leans in to catch his lips instead, grinning at Ryan’s little huff of laughter.

“Coulda just asked,” Ryan mumbles. Alfredo lightly smacks his hand and Ryan turns it palm-up to feel what Alfredo’s about to say.

 _Shut up_ , Alfredo signs.

 _Shutting up_ , Ryan replies.


	5. Chapter 5

Ryan’s gotten pretty good at the criminal lifestyle over the past month and a half, if he says so himself. Wake up, hit the joint, escape, lose the cops in under an hour, get off scot-free and then either use the money or save it. It’s fairly routine, from the gun-cleaning to the drug-dealing, and Alfredo puts a word or two in for him around town, gets the skull mask _noticed_ and, more importantly, _feared_ , tales of torture and violence following Ryan around like a shadow even though the cruellest thing he’s done so far is brain someone with a cleaver from ten feet away.

He likes it, likes the cape of darkness that’s settled over his shoulders, affords him some sort of quiet infamy. Anyone who comes to test out the Vagabond’s reputation is either sent home with their tail between their legs or not sent home at all, in the case of the nosier, more violent ones.

Ryan’s shitty little flat remains his shitty little flat. He earns guns from Alfredo and buys some of his own, keeps the scuffed up rubbery mask and starts using face paint to obscure the eye holes a little bit. Gets a bit carried away with Alfredo and paint one night and ends up with a whole design that makes him even scarier when he takes off the mask. He likes that, as well.

Sometimes he runs into Alfredo during Alfredo’s...other job. It’s funny, Ryan thinks, how he used to be on the side of the cops Alfredo fraternises with – everyone _knows_ , of course, that Alfredo’s a double agent, running between the PD and the gangs, but no one’s foolish enough to try and undermine him. He’s too _good_. He also knows a _dangerous_ amount about either side, but that’s something both the PD and the gangs don’t like to consider.

No matter. Now Ryan’s just small fry, watching from the sidelines as Alfredo brings down crime empires much larger than himself.

\-- 

The alarms in the craft store are ringing when Ryan walks by, some panicked shouting outside and panicked people gathered around the front but there’s nothing apparently _happening_ – security is directing people away from what seems to be a point of interest – the side entrance – and managers are huddled around and Ryan glances down -

And spies a gold checkmark on the pavement beside the neat lawn bordering the craft store.

His head snaps up and _there_ , up ahead, there’s feet disappearing around a corner – Ryan breaks into a run almost immediately, charging forward to chase the mysterious runners. None of security seem to follow him, or even seem to _care_ , and his urgency goes unnoticed by anyone else. He turns into the alley just as they flee around the next corner and Ryan draws his gun while he sprints, hopefully gaining ground on them.

“Oh _fuck_!” He hears, and skids to a stop just in front of the dead end they’ve run into – there’s a rusted chainlink fence behind them; they’d have to climb it to get out, and a spray paint can’s busted open on the ground, a pool of glittering gold spreading beside Gavin, who’s fallen over on his ass.

They’re both looking helplessly at Ryan, eyes flicking nervously between the gun in his hands and his face. He’s sure he must look feral, red from the running and hair a mess from the wind, leather collar popped up to hide his jawline.

“Hey, look,” Jeremy says slowly, raising his hands in surrender. Gavin’s gaze flicks to the gold paint and he gasps a little.

“Jeremy,” he says.

“Not _now_ ,” Jeremy hisses.

“ _Jeremy_ ,” Gavin repeats, more insistent, and Ryan watches in confusion as Jeremy glances back and – and halts, air punching out of him in a soft gasp.

“No,” Jeremy whispers, shaking his head and looking frantically up at Ryan. “No, no, no, no – ”

“What?” Ryan asks, the first word he’s spoken to them – to his _soulmates_. He reaches out a hand and Jeremy stumbles back a panicked step, Gavin shooting back on his hands and accidentally planting one in the gold puddle but he doesn’t even flinch as it splashes on him.

“No – wait,” Ryan spits, tucking the gun in the back of his jeans and lifting his hands to show his palms are empty. His sleeves slide down to expose his wrists as well, show no hidden weapons up them. “Please, _wait_.”

“Stay away,” Jeremy says sternly, reaching down to grab Gavin’s arm and gently help him up. “Stay the _fuck_ away from us.”

“ _Please_ ,” Ryan pleads – Jeremy shakes his head and gestures to the fence. Sirens rise in the distance, no doubt the delayed police response.

“Gav, go.”

“Jeremy, wait, maybe – ”

“No maybes, _go_.”

With that, Jeremy shoves ahead of him to start climbing – but Gavin lingers, glancing between Jeremy’s back and Ryan, who still hasn’t moved a step. Jeremy snaps Gavin’s name and Gavin shoots him a glare but turns to the fence – while Jeremy’s not looking, Gavin turns and clumsily signs something to Ryan one-handed, a desperate hope in his eyes.

It’s an address. A time.

Ryan nods. Gavin nods.

And once more, Ryan watches his soulmates go, quite literally, on the run.

\-- 

“Hey, ‘Fredo,” Ryan greets as he closes the office door behind him, dropping down into a chair.

“Ryan, hey, I need you to lay low for a bit,” Alfredo says, his eyebrows knitted together as he peers down at his desk.

“I have somewhere to be tomorrow,” Ryan says, looking up at Alfredo. “Sorry, kind of last minute - ”

“ _Ryan_ ,” Alfredo says, planting his hands on the desk and leaning forwards. “You have nowhere to be tomorrow but in your damn apartment, that’s where.”

“What do you mean?” Ryan asks with a laugh, trying to lighten the mood and failing when he sees Alfredo’s tight expression. “’Fredo?”

“The FIB’ve opened a case on you,” Alfredo says, spinning around a shabby folder and pushing it towards Ryan. “Agent Ramsey’s the main investigator.”

Ryan opens his mouth to speak and nothing comes out except a soft, shocked _oh_ as he reaches forward to take the folder. He opens it up to find pristine paperwork – _his_ paperwork, his file and his information and – and _mission_ reports and there, paperclipped at the end, a log entry for the start of the case. Against him. _Shit_.

He knew, logically, this would happen, that his mistakes – no, his _choices_ , would catch up with him, but – but reading through it, through the stiff-worded paragraph in Geoff’s familiar handwriting, con _demning_ Ryan, listing all he knows about the day he stopped coming to work, about the day he officially went missing, about – about – about – about –

Ryan notices Geoff never mentioned the note he left.

“Fuck,” Ryan breathes. “ _Fuck_.”

“Yeah,” Alfredo says, leaves it hanging in the air as Ryan stares blankly at the page. “Don’t leave your place.”

“I – I need – Alfredo, I - ” Ryan searches uselessly for the words, the _desperation_ , wanting to explain that he’s got _one_ chance to talk to his soulmates and if he misses it then that’s – that’s _it_ , there’s no way they’ll stick around town for much longer after seeing him and he has no way to find them now, no trace, no IP, not even a gold trademark because he doesn’t doubt they’ll change _that_ , too –

“I – I _need_ to go, Alfredo,” Ryan says, dropping the folder on the desk and looking up at him. “I don’t – they – I don’t have another _chance_ , I – ”

“Hey – _hey_ ,” Alfredo says before Ryan’s breathing can spiral out of control, stepping around the desk to sink into the chair beside Ryan and wrap an arm around him. “Ryan – _breathe_ , okay? Who’s _they_?”

“I - ” The words shrivel up and die on Ryan’s tongue and he just gestures uselessly in his lap.

“Are you in trouble?”

“No, it’s – I – I swear, it’s nothing bad, I just – it’s im _por_ tant,” Ryan babbles, casting a helpless look to Alfredo. “If I miss it then...then I don’t know if I’ll ever see them again.”

Alfredo pauses for a moment, staring back at Ryan for a long minute that stretches far too thin between them, feels like it’ll wrap around Ryan’s nose and mouth and suffocate him slowly.

“Your soulmate,” Alfredo says. “It’s them, isn’t it?”

“Soulmates,” Ryan corrects quietly. “I already lost them once, I can’t – I have to at least _talk_ to them, ‘Fredo – ”

“Okay,” Alfredo says softly, rubbing Ryan’s back in a slow circle. “Okay. Let me just keep you safe, okay?”

“I’m not chancing bringing somebody - ”

“Not like that. Give me the address, I know the cop hotspots for tomorrow.”

Ryan sucks in a shaky breath and hovers, for a sharp moment, on the edge of _something_ , a would-be string in his eyes that he forces away with a steadier exhale.

“...thank you.”

“Yeah,” Alfredo replies. “’Course, buddy.”

\-- 

Ryan tugs up his hood and quickens his pace, walking past crackly streetlights and quiet roads with all the determination of a man much braver than he. In his pockets, his fingers are curled into trembling fists; if he spoke, he’s sure his voice would quaver.

Number 9, 8, 7, 6 – there, 5. Ryan stops outside the squat, plain building and glances around the street. Still empty save for the fog rolling in on the horizon. Still dark save for yellow lamps.

Ryan takes a breath and opens the door to 5 Mercy Rd. at five to midnight.

The inside is nothing but empty space, cleared out for renovations – or maybe demolition. He’s heard the city council’s planning some new spaces out here. Maybe a library or two; knowing city council, probably another club or something equally touristy. You go to LS to get drunk, you get drunk to forget you went to LS.

Dust floats up in a gentle cloud as Ryan ascends the stairs, puffed out with every footstep and leaving a perfect bootprint path behind him. His pistol weighs heavy in the holster strapped on under the hoodie and leather jacket – Alfredo’s idea, the holster. It stretches oddly across Ryan’s shoulders when he turns to inspect the floor below him and, after finding no signs of anyone else around, continues up the stairs.

The wind isn’t as violent as Ryan thought it would be on the roof, a gentle ruffling of his clothes rather than a sharp gust ripping through his hair. He shuts the door behind him with a soft _click_ and doesn’t get more than two steps before he hears voices.

“’M telling you, give ‘im a couple minutes.”

“Ten bucks he shoots us and leaves.”

“ _J_.”

Ryan quietly walks towards them, rounding the AC unit to find Gavin and Jeremy sitting near the edge of the building, heads tipped together as they speak in low tones. Ryan feels suddenly awkward – this is so much worse than just watching them through the webcam, but despite that, there’s giddiness crawling up the back of his neck, making his palms sweat.

Ryan clears his throat to get their attention – their heads whip around and Gavin jumps with a hissed _Christ!_ at his appearance. Jeremy regards him more carefully, getting to his feet without a word and crossing his arms while Gavin stands and leans against the AC unit.

“Thought you’d stood us up,” Gavin jokes. Jeremy doesn’t look impressed.

“Hands out,” Jeremy demands. “Show us you aren’t armed.”

“He’ll be _armed_ , J,” Gavin says. “What, you think he’s walkin’ around with _nothin_ ’?”

“Yeah well, I wanna make sure he’s not about to pull,” Jeremy snaps, fixing Ryan with a glare. “Hands out.”

Ryan withdraws his hands and quickly flicks his hood off before holding them up, oddly reminiscent of the alley just a few days ago, same stand-off with different intentions. He lowers them again when Jeremy nods, letting them dangle carefully by his sides.

“So,” Gavin says when no one speaks. “You didn’t stand us up.”

“This was a bad idea,” Jeremy mumbles.

“Jeremy - ”

“Look at him,” Jeremy says, gesturing angrily to Ryan. “There’s _no_ way – ”

“How about you let him speak, yeah?” Gavin counters, turning his gaze back to Ryan. “Who are you?”

“I’m – Ryan,” Ryan says.

“Sweet. I’m – ”

“Gavin,” Ryan blurts out. “You – You’re Gavin.”

Gavin seems taken aback, blinking as he cocks his head.

“Well, yeah,” he says. “Funny you remembered that.”

 _I couldn’t forget that_ , Ryan wants to say, but they’re talking about two different things. Gavin thinks they’ve only met in an alley after they robbed a craft store and Ryan – Ryan’s known for months. Weeks. It feels like years.

“Unique name,” he jokes weakly. Rubs a hand over his mouth. “And – And Jeremy, that’s – you.” He pauses for a moment, frowns when he realises that something’s a little off under Jeremy’s hood.

“You’ve changed your hair,” he says. Some little part of him feels terribly, awfully _guilty_ , that he scared them so badly Jeremy shaved off anything that ever made him distinctive – Jeremy just huffs and jerks his chin up.

“I do that a lot,” he replies. “So what’s the deal here, huh? You want us to leave? Keep quiet?”

“I – no,” Ryan says. “I don’t – I don’t want anything from you.”

“I don’t trust him,” Jeremy declares to Gavin. “I don’t trust him at all.”

“Jeremy – ”

“No. I’ll be downstairs. I can’t fucking do this, Gav, come down when you’re done,” Jeremy says, tossing his hands up and – just walking away before either Gavin or Ryan can stop him. Gavin reaches out and thinks better of it, his arm curling into his chest as he watches Jeremy go.

“Sorry,” Gavin says after the fire door bangs shut. “He’s – protective.”

“You’d think he wouldn’t leave you up here with a stranger,” Ryan says before he can stop himself.

“He trusts me,” Gavin replies. Ryan doesn’t miss the slight step back he takes anyway.

“How’d you know?” Ryan asks. “That we were – the other day?”

“Y’know,” Gavin says, tucking his hands in his pockets with a shrug. “Colours ‘n all.”

But Ryan knows for a fact Gavin and Jeremy already knew all the colours – or at least a vicious majority of them.

“What colour?” He blurts out. “What colour was I in – for you?”

Gavin pins him with a curious look, perhaps wondering why Ryan’s so nosy about a particular colour.

“Gold,” he says. Ryan utters a soft _oh_.

“Your tag,” he whispers. Gavin bites his lip and looks away.

“Yeah,” he replies. “We chose the one colour we couldn’t see.”

There’s something oddly poetic about that, something that strikes Ryan a little ironic and a little humorous at the same time, and he’s only barely swallowed down his undue laughter when Gavin asks him the inevitable in return.

“What colours were we for you?”

“All of them,” Ryan answers without missing a beat. “Together, you were – all of them.”

“Oh,” Gavin says. A small, slight smile grows on his face. “That’s nice. A nice little group of us.”

Ryan nods. His eyes wander away to the skyline, to the glittering neon skyscrapers plastered across it.

“Look, I can go – ” he starts to say, jerking a thumb over his shoulder.

“No!” Gavin exclaims, his eyes snapping up to Ryan. “No, I – I’d like to at least get to know you. First. Y’know. Since we are – soulmates and all.”

“What about Jeremy?”

“Oh, he’ll get over it,” Gavin scoffs. “He’s just antsy because he thought you’d kill us.”

“I’d say that’s a good reason to be antsy,” Ryan replies, arching an eyebrow. Gavin shrugs and _eh_ s noncommittally.

“But you didn’t,” He says. “Otherwise you would’ve done it by now.”

Ryan allows himself to laugh quietly at that – Gavin glances at him, his eyes sparkling in the moonlight, and his sliver of a smile gives Ryan a little more than desperate hope.

“Tell you what,” Gavin says, tugging out a pen from – nowhere, it seems, deftly spinning around in his fingers to offer it to Ryan. “Give me your number and then we can make plans, yeah?”

“Plans?”

“Yeah, plans! Do this all somewhere a little more – public.” Gavin pulls up his sleeve and presents his wrist to Ryan with a raised eyebrow – it takes Ryan a moment, but he understands eventually and steps forward to write his number on Gavin’s skin, gently gripping his wrist to keep him steady.

“I hear Magnolia’s got lovely ocean views,” Gavin says when Ryan’s done, plucking the pen from his fingers and rolling his sleeve down again. “How does Saturday noon sound?”

“I – ” Ryan coughs out another nervous laugh and admires how smoothly Gavin asked that – is thankful for the blanket of night to hide how his cheeks heat at the question.

“That sounds wonderful,” he says with a pleasant smile.

“We’ll see you then,” Gavin says, and hesitates, and offers a small little wave, completely at odds with his earlier confidence, before ducking behind the AC unit to leave.

Ryan stays on the roof for a moment, slumping against the unit and sighing as he looks up at the glittering stars, his heart fluttering oddly in his chest while a slow, stupid grin spreads over his face.

His phone buzzes in his pocket. A laugh trips out of him, unbidden, and he wonders, idly, if the stars have ever looked quite so beautifully brilliant as they do now.


	6. Chapter 6

Ryan’s made a mistake. He’s made a grave, grave mistake, and that was going out for groceries on Thursday afternoon in the middle of the damn day and he _sorely_ regrets his craving for Cheez-Its. Fuck his tastebuds. Now he’s crouching in a grimy little alleyway, holding his breath and waiting for the cop patrol to stroll past – they’re doing a clean sweep of the are, it seems, but it’s not just the PD. Ryan’s seen SWAT vests, FIB vehicles, tranq guns and riot shields – it’s a search for _him_ , he knows, and it’s far too close to his flat for comfort.

They don’t know where he lives, that he’s sure of. Otherwise they would have banged down his door already.

Next time, he’s being lazier, and instead of trekking out to a proper supermarket, he’ll just go to the damn gas station two blocks away from him.

When the coast seems clear, he darts down the alley, sticking to shadows and corners as he sneaks behind brick buildings, listening carefully for footsteps but it’s hard with the sirens running in the background and the roar of engines as vehicles are sent out. He keeps his head ducked low as he inches around another corner, glancing around quickly before jogging down it, keeping as quiet as he can –

Something bodily slams him face-first into the brick wall, a hand splayed between his shoulder blades and the other grabbing his wrists and pinning them to his back, twisting them up when he tries to struggle. _Fuck_.

“What the fuck are you playing at?” They growl – a _familiar_ growl, a rough timbre that Ryan recognises –

“Geoff,” he gasps.

“Shut up,” Geoff says, but Ryan notices he hasn’t called for backup yet. “What the _fuck_ are you doing?”

“I – can explain,” Ryan says, although he can’t, really. _Yeah, I saw my soulmates on camera and then ran away to pursue a life of crime_. It doesn’t sound good whichever way he slices it.

“Then explain,” Geoff says, releasing him enough to turn him around and pin his back to the wall, his steely glare sharp in a way it’s never been towards Ryan. In that _Agent Ramsey_ way.

“The assignment,” Ryan says. “You know about my classified.”

“Yeah,” Geoff says gruffly. “I know. Watchin’ some idiots in Texas. Then you just up and left.”

“They weren’t just any idiots,” Ryan breathes. “They were two-bit criminals.”

“And what, you decided you wanted to join?”

“They got caught,” Ryan continues, acutely aware of the way Geoff’s fingers curl in his jacket. “They came here.”

“And what the fuck does _that_ have to do with anything?” Geoff spits. He looks stern, _serious_ , and Ryan – Ryan doesn’t blame him at all. “For fuck’s sakes, Ryan, you just disappeared off the face of the earth! And I don’t even know what _for_ , not for some fucking two-bit criminal hicks – ”

“They’re my soulmates,” Ryan blurts out. Geoff freezes, his eyes searching Ryan’s for a long, tight moment.

“Your _what_?” he says.

“My – soulmates,” Ryan says quietly. “When – When I first watched them, it – I - ” He trails off and Geoff lets him go, shoving him back against the wall with one last push and rubbing a hand over his mouth.

“Jesus Christ,” he whispers, looking anywhere but Ryan.

“Geoff, please, I didn’t – ”

“Didn’t what? Think? Fuck, Ryan, I thought you were _dead_ ,” Geoff hisses, and Ryan reaches out towards him – stops himself, when Geoff flinches ever so slightly, and his hand curls in against his chest.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry, I didn’t – I didn’t mean to just leave you.”

“Fuck it,” Geoff says. “We haven’t got time for this. You got a number or something?”

“A – A phone number?” Ryan asks, utterly taken aback by the change of tone.

“Yeah, asshole, so I can contact you,” Geoff shoots back.

“You’re not gonna turn me in?”

Geoff doesn’t answer, just tugs out a pen and paper and thrusts them into Ryan’s hands. Ryan hastily scribbles a burner number down and Geoff tucks the notepad away. He hesitates before moving again, his eyes roaming around Ryan.

“Geoff – ”

“I’m not – gonna turn you in,” Geoff sighs, running a hand through his hair. “Just – go. I’ll text you.”

“Thank you,” Ryan breathes, and Geoff nods, clicking on the radio on his shoulder and turning to speak into it.

“East side is clear, think we saw movement on the west,” he says, giving Ryan a meaningful look. “Over.”

With that, Geoff gestures down the alley. Ryan signs another _thank you_ and runs.

\-- 

“You don’t think he’ll betray you?” Alfredo asks, spinning noodles around on his chopsticks.

“No,” Ryan answers with a shake of his head, poking at the chicken in his takeout box. “He’s not like that.”

“When you meeting him?”

Ryan lifts a shoulder in a half-shrug, crossing his ankles under the table and glancing out at the rest of the restaurant, a few patrons scattered amongst other tables.

“He hasn’t texted yet,” Ryan replies. A part of him hopes Geoff never texts, just leaves Ryan to his own devices. A larger part of him desperately wants his friend back. “You got anything we can do?”

“This late?” Alfredo asks, raising an eyebrow. Ryan nods, a touch sheepishly, and turns back to his box. There’s still adrenaline jittering in his bones, panic set at a low thrum throughout his whole body, and he already knows he’s not getting any sleep tonight unless he works it out somehow.

“I think I got a race nearby,” Alfredo says after a moment, knocking Ryan’s elbow with his own. “Down near the beach. Loser buys ice cream?”

Ryan laughs and nods with a pleased smile, his eyes flicking over Alfredo’s face in quiet consideration.

“You mean _you’re_ buying ice cream,” he says.

“Oh, you’re gonna _wish_ I was.”

\-- 

Gavin and Jeremy are even brighter in real life than over the screen, and Ryan’s so wrapped up in the colours of their happiness he doesn’t even notice the pastel rows of macarons behind the counter, or the brilliant blue of the ocean outside the window. Or anything, in fact, except for how Gavin’s laugh makes Jeremy’s eyes light up.

It had been awkward, at first, Ryan hovering near the pair and sitting down across from them, but a few stilted, forced lines of small talk later and Gavin had managed to smooth it out between them, enough for easy banter and light-hearted questions as crumbly coffee cake crumbles right off his fork.

Jeremy still doesn’t trust Ryan, Ryan can tell, his posture tense and his gaze guarding, but he hides it well. Shares bites of Gavin’s cake and sips coffee and converses freely, if a touch shortly, with Ryan. Ryan’s far too enchanted with the pair to even _mind_ Jeremy’s defensive behaviour.

“’S funny that we all ended up in the same place,” Gavin says, pressed shoulder-to-shoulder to Jeremy as he stirs his drink. “Little happy accident.”

“Yeah,” Ryan lies, his tongue thick and clumsy in his mouth. _Accident_. The only accident here is the coincidence of Ryan’s assignment and Ryan himself.

“What’re you doing, then?” Jeremy asks, scratching his chin.

“Could ask the same of you,” Ryan counters. “Stealing gold paint?”

“Eh, easier than buyin’ it,” Gavin says with a shrug. Ryan laughs at that and Gavin shoots him a sly grin.

“’Sides,” Gavin continues. “We’re not exactly Mr. Moneybags here.”

“For a $4.99 can of paint?” Ryan asks skeptically, arching an eyebrow.

“Save when you can, yeah?”

“Yeah, you got me there,” Ryan agrees.

Another few minutes pass in pleasant silence, just the sound of the waves and clinking cutlery and quiet chatter filling the spaces around them. Ryan’s not supposed to be out of his flat, but at least it’s relatively safe for him right now – the cops are searching farther to the north, well enough away, but Ryan doesn’t like that he can see the LSPD chopper hovering over the proceedings from Magnolia, rather like the proverbial sword of Dionysus hanging over Ryan’s head.

“Hey, ‘m gonna pop to the toilet,” Gavin says, pushing his plate away and patting Jeremy’s arm before standing up to wind his away around the other tables towards the restrooms in the back, apologising quickly to a little girl he bumps into on the way.

Ryan feels more awkward alone with Jeremy, avoiding making eye contact but sneaking glances over nonetheless – Jeremy’s picking at a loose thread on his sleeve, eyes downcast and his fingers tapping a frenetic beat against his cup.

“Hey, uh, where do you live?” Jeremy asks – Ryan flinches back an inch, his spoon clattering against his mug with his surprise. Jeremy’s head snaps up and his eyebrows pinch together, his mouth opening to speak again, words tumbling out like – like he’s _nervous_.

“Not – Not _where_ , no, I meant – I meant, like, wherea _bouts_ ,” he babbles. “We, uh, we’re on the west side of the city. What, uh, where are you? General direction?”

Ryan regards him carefully, his gaze darting over Jeremy’s open, sincere expression before he leans on the table once more, quietly dragging his spoon out of his coffee.

“East,” he says, keeping the precarious eye contact with Jeremy. He’s _handsome_ , more so now that Ryan’s _really_ looking at him.

“Kind of the wrong side of the tracks,” Ryan jokes, and Jeremy huffs out a quiet chuckle. Ryan considers that a win.

A beat passes. Ryan looks out at the ocean, Jeremy doesn’t.

“You’re really protective of Gavin,” Ryan says, sweeping his gaze over the wide expanse of the horizon before fixing it on Jeremy. Jeremy swallows and looks down at his folded arms on the table.

“Yeah – ” he clears his throat and tries again, “ – Yeah, I, uh. I guess.”

“It’s nice,” Ryan admits, curling his hands around his warm mug. “That you – look out for each other.”

Jeremy nods solemnly and flexes his fists, nervously biting his lip.

“So you couldn’t – you couldn’t see any colours until last week?” He asks. It’s Ryan’s turn to avoid his gaze, looking down at the polished table while Jeremy frowns. “That’s – wow.”

“It’s fine,” Ryan says, lifting one shoulder in a shrug and desperately wishing for Gavin to come back so this part of the conversation could be _over_ already.

“I’m – sorry,” Jeremy says. Ryan’s head snaps up.

“What?”

“’M...sorry, I guess. Feel a little bad that while we were – I don’t know, we’ve been together for years now, and you’ve been without that this whole time.”

“I – oh. Oh, no, it’s – there’s no way you could’ve known,” Ryan mumbles. “Don’t worry about it.”

“But it’s – ”

“Forget about it,” Ryan says, perhaps a little too harshly, because Jeremy flinches the tiniest amount and nods, dropping the topic to leave them in awkward silence.

“Sorry,” Ryan whispers. Jeremy doesn’t respond to that save for a hum of acknowledgement.

“Y’know, uh,” Jeremy starts a minute later, running a thumb over his lower lip. “I think Gavin’s trying to get me to pay for his drink.”

“What makes you think that?” Ryan asks with a huff of laughter.

“He’s out there,” Jeremy replies, jerking his chin out to the window – Ryan follows his gaze and sure enough, Gavin’s out on the balcony, arms folded over the railing as he looks out at the ocean, blue and vibrant and noisy with crashing waves.

“The _sneak_ ,” Jeremy hisses. Ryan’s shoulders shake with quiet laughter and a quiet chuckle slips out – a grin tugs at Jeremy’s mouth and they lock eyes and collapse into laughter together, an oddly freeing moment after the uncomfortable tension that had settled between them. 

And it’s – it’s easier, after that, back to smooth conversation and gentle mockery of Gavin and Jeremy does indeed pay for Gavin despite his grumbling and Ryan does indeed tease Gavin about it when they join him on the balcony. It’s so familiar, so comfortable, that when Jeremy calmly asks him about _dinner sometime, meet at Maze Bank on Tuesday at eight?_ , Ryan doesn’t even hesitate to agree, doesn’t even _realise_ the meaning behind it – they like him enough to do this _again_ – until they’ve parted ways and he’s sneaking down another alleyway.


	7. Chapter 7

Ryan’s nervous. So goddamn nervous he feels like he could rattle right out of his skin if the tremble in his nerves gets any worse.

It’s funny, he thinks, that in his years at the agency, he never felt something quite as _choking_ as this. Perhaps it was the knowledge he had people on his back, had the _government_ on his side, no matter how corrupt it is. Knew as long as he followed orders and kept his head down he would be safe, and he’s always been good at following orders. It’s partly why Kelly liked him so much.

Regretpanicfearregret creeps up his throat again and he forces it all down with a harsh, thick swallow, abruptly swivelling on his heel to resume his pacing and aimlessly trying to distract himself by fiddling with the slide on his pistol.

He’s just thinking that maybe he should have asked Alfredo to come along when the door creaks open – Ryan turns smoothly on his heel and raises the gun and finds Geoff pointing one right back at him, the barrel peeking around the door and Geoff peering around the edge of it to stare him down.

“You alone?” Geoff asks brusquely. Ryan nods and Geoff’s eyes flick to the shadowy corners of the dimly-lit room, his movements cautious as he steps in and shuts the door behind him.

“Anyone follow you?” Ryan asks in return, lowering his gun and stepping back to give Geoff more room. Geoff grunts a negative and tucks his gun back into the holster around his belt – out of courtesy, Ryan does the same, shoving it into his waistband at his back and flashing his open palms at Geoff to prove it.

“Okay, so what the fuck is going on?” Geoff spits, crossing his arms. Ryan winces.

“The classified,” Ryan says.

“I know all about the fucking _classified_. What I don’t know is why the fuck you just up and _ran_. You better have some fucking explanations, Haywood, because we all thought you were fucking _dead_.”

Ryan opens his mouth to speak but Geoff ploughs on, striding forward to jab Ryan in the chest with his fingers, his accusations almost as forceful as the way he forces Ryan to walk backwards.

“I thought you’d got yourself fucking _shot_ or something – Jack thought you were dead, _Michael_ thought you were dead! How the fuck could you do this to us, you fucking idiotic, selfish _asshole_! There was a fucking MIA on your file for _weeks_! And what, leaving a fucking cryptic note at my door that just says you’re alive? Oh great, thanks, that’s a real big fuckin’ help – ”

“I’m _sorry_ ,” Ryan coughs out, backed up against the wall and not even fighting back; he knows what he deserves, and it’s a lot worse than this. “I’m _sorry_ , Geoff, I didn’t – I didn’t know what I was doing, I – I – _please_ , you have to believe me, I didn’t mean to scare you guys.”

“Well you did a real good fuckin’ job of that,” Geoff hisses. Ryan sucks in a shaky breath and Geoff’s hand drops from his chest, dangling uselessly between them before he angrily runs it through his hair, looking away from Ryan.

“Geoff – ”

“Your funeral’s in two months,” Geoff says, and this time he doesn’t look Ryan in the eye when he explains what Ryan already knows. “That’s how much time we have before they proclaim you dead.”

“Let them,” Ryan says quietly. “It’ll be better, it’ll – ”

“Ryan, I don’t think you under _stand_ ,” Geoff insists, his bluegrey eyes snapping up to Ryan. “We all thought you were dead.”

“I’m sorry – ”

“I’m not even _talking_ about the case anymore, I’m talking how I thought my best fucking friend was _dead_ , and he didn’t even fucking bother to contact me aside from one goddamn note. How could you _do_ that to us?”

Ryan opens his mouth and closes it, flails for words and feels that familiar panic-itch break across his palms, his scalp, drying up his tongue and making his chest tight and –

“Because I had to,” he whispers. “Geoff, I had to, I couldn’t – I couldn’t drag you in on this as well – ”

“Bullshit,” Geoff says. “I could’ve helped.”

“Geoff, you _know_ I didn’t want to stay at the agency anyway – ”

“I’m not talking about that kind of help,” Geoff says angrily. “I mean not getting yourself _killed_ running out here with the gangs. What the hell were you _thinking_ , Ryan?”

“I’ve had help,” Ryan admits. Geoff’s eyebrows knit together.

“Who?”

“Diaz.”

Geoff utters a quiet _oh_ and nods, dragging a hand over his beard as he looks over at another wall.

“Still,” he says, deflated, like all the fiery anger’s drained right out of him. “I wish you’d told us.”

“I wanted to,” Ryan says immediately, fervently, trying to catch Geoff’s eyes again. “You have to believe me, I wanted to, I just – couldn’t.”

Geoff nods silently. Moments pass where Ryan itches to reach out and – and do what, he doesn’t know, somehow clear that fog in Geoff’s eyes, dissolve the distrustful tension radiating from him, just _be_ there – but instead he presses his palms flat to the wall behind him and recites the Miranda rights in his head just for the calm for mindless repetition.

_Right to remain silent._

_Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law._

_You have the right to_ –

“So what’s it like, then?” Geoff asks, breaking him out of his thoughts. “Being a hotshot criminal and all.”

“Messy,” Ryan jokes.

“Terrifying,” he admits, more seriously.

“Diaz been treatin’ you well?”

“Uh, yeah. Yeah, he’s been – he’s been good.” Ryan relaxes a little, leaning against the wall rather than pressing to it, bringing his hands around to stuff them into his pockets.

“What sort of stuff you doing?”

“All sorts.”

“Helpful,” Geoff snorts, and Ryan shrugs lightly, a smile tugging at his lips.

“Can’t go around giving away all my secrets,” he replies.

“Well fill me in on a few,” Geoff says, fixing him with a strange look. “What, you see your soulmates, drop from the agency to find them? You don’t even know where they are. Their last known location is Texas.”

Their last known location was Maze Bank, Tuesday at eight p.m., on a meet-up with Ryan that he hesitates to call a date and that was cut short by an early cop patrol sweeping through the area because of a drug tip-off.

Their _next_ known location is hopefully the Thai place on the corner of Vinewood and Peaty on Friday at seven.

“They came here,” Ryan says evenly. “I wiped the evidence.”

“Of course they did,” Geoff mutters. “Okay so, they came here. And what, you’ve been trying to find them?”

Ryan looks away. Tugs on his jacket and clears his throat. Drops his head.

“Not trying anymore,” he says quietly, almost inaudibly, but Geoff’s always been able to single him out.

“You _found_ them? Jesus Christ, Ryan, anything else you haven’t told me?”

_I’m the Vagabond. I live in a shitty flat next to a Chinese place and I don’t have a bedframe. I almost got killed last week in a car chase. Diaz is a lot better than the FIB give him credit for._

_I’m scared._

_I think I’ve made a mistake._

“I’m the Vagabond,” Ryan settles on, hesitant, slow, his fingers balling up into fists in his pockets as Geoff pins him with a jaw-dropped stare. Mousy little Haywood a renowned criminal? Impossible.

“ _What_?” Geoff breathes, eyebrows shooting into his hairlines. “Ryan, you’re – _what_?!”

“You’ve heard of me,” Ryan guesses, kind of _knows_ , knows he’s on a list somewhere, somehow, maybe a watchlist the PD handed over to Kelly, maybe Kelly took the notes himself from the news. The Vagabond’s one to watch.

“ _Heard_ of you?! The agency’s opening a whole new _case_ for you!” Geoff exclaims.

When Ryan doesn’t respond with more than a shrug, Geoff sighs. Drags a hand over his mouth.

“Well what can I tell the others, then?” Geoff asks. Ryan quirks an eyebrow.

“The others?”

“Jack, Michael, y’know. Your _friends_.”

Ryan flinches at the harsh reminder. Swallows down his guilt and panic and funnily enough the Venn diagramme of everything he wants to blurt out and everything he can’t get past his knotted tongue is a circle.

“Tell them I’m sorry,” Ryan says. “And tell them to forget about me.”

“Yeah _right_ ,” Geoff scoffs. “Kind of hard to remember someone you’ve known for years.”

“Well you’ll have to try, then, won’t you?” Ryan spits back, riled up from regretregret and everything boiling down to twist into bitter anger. “It’ll be better for all of you. Safer.”

“And what about you?” Geoff retorts. “What if you need help, huh? Who you gonna fucking go to? Diaz? Your soulmates? Have you even _told_ them how you found them?”

“That sounds like none of your business.”

“I think my friends are my damn business!”

“Well good thing I’m not one of those,” Ryan snaps, his hands shaking in his pockets and _anger_ thrumming under his skin, vibrating through his fingers and his toes and curling acid on his tongue and even as he sees the flash of hurt in Geoff’s eyes he pushes down the guilt again. “Just fucking forget me, Geoff.”

“Ryan – ”

“Don’t you need to go?” Ryan bites out, the anger and the violent urge to _runrunrunrun_ flipping over into panic that settles at the base of his skull, crawls up to set in his teeth and dial up his senses until even the faintest brush of his shirt against his throat chokes him.

Geoff checks his watch and sighs through his teeth, glaring at Ryan.

“Yeah. I do,” he says. He rubs his wrist and breaks the eye contact to stride to the exit door beside them. He hesitates before pushing on it.

“I’ll contact you,” he says, a well-meant promise licking at the words.

“Don’t bother.”

Geoff doesn’t say anything else before he leaves. Ryan tips his head back against the wall and listens to the door close.

Not a moment passes before he’s rushing to push it open, hoping uselessly for Geoff to be – lingering, or staying, or any other sort of stupid action that would give Ryan a second chance, but life doesn’t work like that and Ryan has never wanted to kick himself more.

He settles for kicking the wall instead. Retreats back inside to wait for Alfredo and sinks to the floor. Pretends the stinging in his eyes doesn’t exist. Waits for retribution he knows won’t come because Geoff’s always been soft on him.

Biggest mistake of Geoff’s fucking life, he thinks.

\-- 

“How are they?” Alfredo asks, one leg bent so he can rest his elbow on it. Ryan picks at the label on his cola bottle and leans more heavily against the rock, watching the city stretched out below them, the fireworks exploding on the pier.

He’s never been up Chiliad before, except for a couple first dates that never went anywhere else, and even those were just the cable car station. But Alfredo’s unfolded a whole new lifestyle right before him – from the drugs to the gunfights to the way Los Santos looks in the heavy hours of the night from way up above, to the strange triumph of motorbiking all the way up a goddamn mountain just to share a few drinks and look at the view. It’s intoxicating in more ways than one.

“They’re – good,” Ryan says. “They’re amazing.”

“I’m glad,” Alfredo says. He takes a few slow drags of his beer. “I’m glad you found them. You deserve good soulmates.”

Ryan frowns and rips off part of the paper, rolling it into a ball between his fingertips and smushing it against the condensation-soaked glass again, wondering idly if it’ll stick again. It doesn’t.

“What about – us?” He asks quietly, giving Alfredo a concerned look. “I don’t – you – I don’t want to – fuck things up.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that,” Alfredo says easily, smiling pleasantly at him.

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. It’s not – there was never much more to it,” Alfredo adds. “To us. I mean, you’re a great friend and a good – sex partner and all, but otherwise there’s – nothing else there for me.”

Ryan nods. His eyebrows knit together.

“Would it be bad to say I felt the same?” He asks. Alfredo laughs.

“Nah. But I think we mean it in different ways.”

Ryan arches a curious eyebrow and Alfredo tips his head back against the rock, sighing quietly.

“Y’know,” he starts. Waves a hand in the air. “Romance and all that. Never really been there for me.”

“What about your soulmate?” Ryan says. Alfredo shrugs.

“There’s people who’ve given me colour,” he says. “But they’re, like, friend soulmates? I guess. They were never anyone I’ve tried to date.”

“Platonic?” Ryan fills in.

“Okay, _platonic_ soulmates, Mr. Theatre Nerd.” Alfredo playfully rolls his eyes and Ryan laughs, setting the bottle down between his legs and idly twisting the base into the ground.

“ _Anyway_ ,” Alfredo says after he’s stopped chuckling. “Yeah, whatever, I’ve got a bunch of platonic ones, then.”

“That’s – interesting,” Ryan says. “I’ve never met anyone who’s had that before. Knowingly, at least.”

Alfredo nods, sips his drink again and waits for the next thunderous bout of fireworks to pass before speaking again.

“You were one of them,” he says.

“Really?”

“Yep. Gave me – blue, yeah. Nice colour.”

“Huh,” Ryan muses, looking at the purplegreenredgold fireworks bursting over the ocean. “You didn’t give me anything.”

“I’ve been told it can be subtle before,” Alfredo points out. “Like, a richer shade of something or whatever. You probably didn’t notice.”

“Ah.”

“I don’t blame you, dude, I probably wouldn’t have noticed that sort of thing.”

Ryan nods and watches the next bright explosion of fireworks, admires how the sparkles fall back to the ocean like the stars themselves are dripping from the sky.

“I’m glad I met you, though,” Ryan says. Alfredo nudges his elbow.

“I’m glad I met you, too,” he replies with a happy grin. A week ago, Ryan would have kissed him, but now he’s tentatively befriending Gavin and Jeremy, now he just nudges Alfredo in return and smiles back.

“Now, what the fuck colour is that boat?” Alfredo asks, pointing down at a skinny little yacht docked at Vespucci. “I can’t tell if it’s red or purple.”

\-- 

Gavin and Jeremy somehow trust Ryan enough to order _for_ them at the Thai place, but what touches him more is how much they seem to trust him in _general_ now, pressed in close in the little corner booth, Ryan’s shoulder up against Gavin’s and Jeremy on Gavin’s other side, giggling over stupid jokes while they figure out how to split up the sharing plates.

And Jeremy doesn’t seem as wary of Ryan anymore – still hesitant, a little, still doesn’t get too close, but doesn’t flinch from his touch, doesn’t shoot him odd, calculating glances when he moves too fast.

“What’s that? Chicken?” Gavin asks, reaching forward for a skewer the same time as Ryan.

“Yeah,” Ryan says, and their hands brush, and Gavin doesn’t flinch, and Ryan’s knuckles tingle even when he eventually pulls away.

And Gavin sits back and Jeremy rests and arm on his shoulders to lean over and take something from his plate and his fingers nudge Ryan’s shoulder and don’t retract. Ryan takes the easy, fleeting touches as they come, lights up a little when they’re given freely, like the way Gavin knocks his elbow, or the way Jeremy grabs his arm to steady him when he trips over something on the way back to their separate vehicles.

In another universe, Ryan thinks, where he’s not an ex-agent and Gavin and Jeremy aren’t distrusting criminals, he’d ask if he could kiss them before they get in their car.

But as it is, Ryan’s no better than a crooked cop and Gavin and Jeremy shouldn’t trust him, and he just waves as they drive off.

\-- 

There’s a jangling at Ryan’s lock – he glances curiously, concernedly at it, but a moment later the door violently busts in, kicked open and the metal lock ripped away from the wall as Ryan scrambles to stand up, facing the figures in the doorway, facing –

“This is your fucking fault,” Michael spits, shoving Geoff into the room before him and kicking the door shut behind him.

“M-Michael,” Ryan says, and glances at the bloody nose Geoff’s nursing, his palm pressed to his nose as he glares at Ryan.

“Got fucking kicked out of the agency,” Michael says, rolling a shoulder before turning to head to Ryan’s kitchen. “Dishonourable _fucking_ discharge!”

Geoff walks over to sink down on Ryan’s bed, using his shirt now to stop the bleeding a little bit; Ryan looks frantically between the two, his hands hovering like he’s about to do something but he doesn’t know _what_.

“You have any alcohol in here?” Michael asks as he opens the fridge. Ryan does – technically it’s Alfredo’s, but Ryan’s not going to nitpick when Michael’s busting the cap off with the edge of his granite counter, grunting as foam spills over his knuckles. At least he’s considerate enough to let it spill into the sink before he takes a hearty swig. He turns to Ryan to point the neck at him accusingly, walking back into the main space.

“He was trying to fucking cover for you,” Michael spits, gesturing at Geoff. “’Cept the _asshole_ didn’t tell me what was going on and here I was, bein’ a good fuckin’ Samaritan and all, backing him up, and turns out it’s all _horseshit_ anyway! They had fucking _footage_!”

Ryan glances at Geoff, who shrugs sheepishly.

“I never dragged Michael into it,” he says, his voice thick and muffled through the shirt.

“You never pushed me _out_ of it,” Michael counters, and levels Ryan with a glare.

“What about Lindsay?” Ryan asks quietly. Michael scoffs and waves the bottle dismissively.

“None of your business.”

Ryan nods. That’s fair, yeah.

“Sorry?” He offers.

“Too fucking late for that,” Michael replies, and takes another sip before walking over to Geoff, clapping him on the shoulder. “But you’re the one fucking helping us.”

Michael breezes past to inspect the balcony, his wedding ring clinking against the bottle as he drinks. Ryan collapses on the bed beside Geoff, pressing his hands to his face as he inhales shakily, letting it out in a sigh that borders on more than just air. Geoff pats his back and sneezes wetly into his shirt, groaning at the rush of blood that must come with it.

“You got an icepack around?” He asks nasally.

“Kitchen,” Ryan murmurs. “Freezer.”

Geoff nods and stands up to wobble over to the cramped kitchen, sniffling loudly and cursing quietly as he roots through Ryan’s scant freezer.

Ryan pinches the bridge of his nose.

How the _fuck_ is he going to explain this to Alfredo? 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case it didn't come across clearly enough (which would be my fault, let me know!), that conversation was supposed to canonify aro Alfredo.


	8. Chapter 8

“What the fuck is this?”

“It’s a .52 automatic, Geoff.”

“No, no, what the fuck is _this_ , what are we _doing_?” Geoff asks, his mouth drawn up in distaste as Ryan straps body armour on himself with a sigh.

“We’re meeting Diaz,” he replies calmly, glancing over at Michael on the other side of the bed. “And you don’t go to meetings unarmed.”

“Fuck’s sake, we know how to take care of ourselves,” Michael spits. “We were field agents, y’know.”

“Yeah, and if you’re gonna come to me for help, you’re gonna fucking listen to the help I give you, okay?” Ryan shoots back, shrugging his heavy leather jacket on over the armour. “Take the damn guns and put on the damn armour. We’re leaving in ten minutes.”

With that, Ryan heads to the kitchen to grab a soda – Michael mumblingly mimics him in a mockingly high voice and Ryan ignores it, taking a moment to just gather himself before he faces them again. Counts the number of mouldy tiles on the wall, the cracks in the chopping board – too many, is the answer to both.

“Okay,  _boss_ , we’re ready,” Michael sneers, his tone _dripping_ venom. Ryan closes his eyes and sighs quietly, steels himself by cracking open the soda can before turning around to look at them, begrudgingly impressed by how well-put-together they look.

“I’m driving,” Ryan says, and drains the soda in one go.

\-- 

“Jesus Christ Ryan, you’ve really fucked things up in there, huh?” Alfredo whispers.

“I know,” Ryan replies just as quietly, his shaking hands stuffed into his pockets. They’re outside Alfredo’s office, left Geoff and Michael sitting inside when Alfredo dragged Ryan outside “to talk”.

“What the fuck were you thinking?” Alfredo asks, not unkindly. “Ryan – ”

“I didn’t mean to,” Ryan breathes, closing his eyes. “I didn’t – Geoff got caught, I didn’t – I didn’t _mean_ for any of this to happen, ‘Fredo – ”

He doesn’t even realise he’s hyperventilating until Alfredo’s palm is on his chest, guiding him into slower breaths as Alfredo murmurs reassurances.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, Ryan, it’s okay,” he says, and they rest there a moment, Ryan trying to follow the presses of Alfredo’s hand and pretending his throat isn’t locked up tight like the max-security cells back at the FIB.

“Look at me, Ryan,” Alfredo says gently. He waits, patiently, and a few seconds later Ryan opens his eyes, meeting Alfredo’s calm, steady gaze.

It’s only been a couple of weeks since Geoff and Michael got discharged, a couple weeks of fear and panic and the dagger-sharp glares of betrayal that didn’t soften with time, that Ryan knows he deserves but doesn’t _want_ , wants to curl up into a ball and just run away and leave everyone and everything behind and runrun until his feet ache and his legs hurt and he can’t run anymore and maybe he’ll find a new pot of gold at the end of a different rainbow instead of futilely chasing this one.

“It’ll be okay,” Alfredo says, and Ryan so desperately wants to believe him. “You said you already cleared them from the databases, right?”

Ryan nods. Alfredo’s palm presses down on his exhale.

“We can deal with this,” Alfredo says.

“ _I_ can,” Ryan corrects. “You – You don’t have to do – ”

“ _We_ can,” Alfredo repeats, firmer. He cracks a small grin, one that tempts Ryan’s mouth to curve up a little as well.

“I didn’t spend all this time just to leave you in the dust,” Alfredo says, and Ryan believes him.

\-- 

It’s slow-going at first, teaching ex-feds how to be proper criminals. Michael takes to the fighting quicker, as Ryan expected, but Geoff takes to the lying spectacularly easily, finagling his way out of awkward situations and double-crosses with a practiced ease that would make Ryan question Geoff’s background if he hadn’t known him for over a decade already.

It’s when Alfredo proposes a full four-person job that Ryan gets nervous. He’s used to the flow and pull of two people, and the gears between him and Geoff and Michael don’t grind quite so much as they used to six weeks ago, not quite forgiveness but not open maliciousness either. Ryan’s just glad he can breathe in the same room as them.

Shockingly enough, it doesn’t crash and fucking burn like Ryan was expecting. He barrels into the joint with Michael, _hands above your head, don’t fuckin’ move!_ and after they blow a few holes in the ceiling while shooting the cameras and raid the display counters, they push through to the safes in the manager’s office. They don’t even need the code-crackers Alfredo gave them – the manager’s terrified enough he just gives up the numbers the first time they ask, and the cruel laugh Michael gives in response makes Ryan thinks crime suits him well.

So they empty out the safe and Alfredo’s voice crackles in their ears to tell them police response is coming in two minutes, get out, and even weighed down by their duffles, they make a sprint to the street, guns up in case any heroes try anything – and a clunky silver car rolls up to them, doors pushed open by the occupants so Michael and Ryan can bundle inside and Geoff _guns_ the shitty little engine – or not so shitty after all, purring smooth as a jaguar. Ryan gives Alfredo a knowing look and Alfredo just smiles slyly in reply. Sneaky fucker, modding his hatchbacks.

The cops trip them up a little, but not much, because Michael soon figures out the careful finesse of aiming in a speeding vehicles, yelling at Geoff for hitting speed bumps while he reloads and ducking down to avoid losing his head on the low bridge while Ryan shoots out the back window to shatter windshields and crack heads.

And they get off scot-free – a few dings to their car here and there, some from bullets, some from when Geoff nearly drove them right off a cliff, but after a lot of screaming and only _mild_ panic, they emerge onto the quiet streets of La Mesa to ditch the vehicle and split up to make their way back to Ryan’s place.

And afterwards, while Alfredo locks the car, Michael shoots Ryan a smile and a thumbs-up, and something eases in Ryan’s chest.

\-- 

“I’m going out, don’t destroy anything,” Ryan calls, swinging his keys around his index finger before pocketing them.

“Where you going?” Michael asks.

“Out,” Ryan says pointedly. “I’ll be back later.”

“You need backup?” Geoff asks from the makeshift milk crate sofa, a touch kinder than Michael. Ryan chuckles.

“Definitely not,” he says.

They don’t question him further as he leaves. He breathes a sigh of relief when he gets outside, and another when he opens his car door.

The drive over, Ryan’s awash with jittery nerves – just like the time before, and the time before that, and a sort of hesitant happiness settles in his chest as he realises that this is a semi-regular thing now, these – _dates_.

When he pulls up to the bowling alley, Gavin and Jeremy are already outside – and _oh_ , Ryan’s awfully fond of the way pink neon reflects off of Gavin’s hair, off of Jeremy’s aviators. They’re talking quietly by the entrance, but calmly, interrupted with laughter and affectionate touches that Ryan can’t even be jealous of, too wrapped up in memorising all their colourful details.

“Hey, Ry!” Gavin exclaims, sticking a hand out to shake when he approaches. Ryan’s heart does _flips_ at the nickname – something Gavin toyed with on their last date, determined to make a silly moniker for him, and although it’s not quite silly, it’s certainly _fond_.

“You ready to get your ass kicked?” Jeremy asks, clapping him on the shoulder.

“Didn’t know you were a bowling master,” Ryan quips right back, returning Jeremy’s smile.

“Oh yeah I am,” Jeremy assures him.

“He really isn’t,” Gavin says as they all move towards the entrance. “Only strike he can get is in baseball.”

“Hey, I’m better than you,” Jeremy protests.

“I trust a lot of people are better than Gavin,” Ryan jokes – Jeremy breaks into loud, bright laughter and Gavin gasps, pressing a dramatic hand over his heart.

“You’re worse than J!” He claims.

“Prove me wrong,” Ryan says while Jeremy steps up to the shoe counter.

“I will,” Gavin promises, a mischievous glint in his eye.

\-- 

Jeremy ends up winning, but it’s Ryan who’s trailing dust at the end, a good forty points behind Gavin and absolutely taking shit for it.

“You guys are good at this,” Ryan says after his turn, watching his ball knock down a solid two pins out of twelve and roll right into the damn gutter – Gavin sucks on his straw and laughs while Jeremy stands up for his turn.

“Okay, it’s prolly a little unfair,” Gavin says. Ryan shoots him a look.

“We used to go bowling all the time,” Gavin continues. “In our old town. Every Saturday, if we could.”

 _I know_ , almost trips off of Ryan’s tongue, but he catches it just in time, swallowing his dirty little secret along with the stale air of the alley.

“Wow, didn’t realise you were such fanatics,” he teases instead.

“Wasn’t much else to do,” Gavin says around a smile. Jeremy gets a spare and comes back with a triumphant fistpump, grinning at both of them.

“Don’t worry, we’ll train you up,” Gavin says with a wink – Ryan’s breath stutters at the implication that they’ll do this more, and he almost forgets to smile as Gavin sets his drink down and picks up a ball.

“Havin’ fun?” Jeremy asks, picking up Gavin’s drink to sip from it.

“Absolutely,” Ryan says. He looks up at the scoreboard and grins, nudging Jeremy’s elbow.

“Bet you dessert that I can catch up to Gavin by the time the round ends,” he says.

“Oh, you’re _on_ ,” Jeremy laughs.

\-- 

Ryan drives home – his little flat, home, he knows, but when he thinks the word _home_ he doesn’t think of the little flat or even of his old house, he thinks of colour and brightness and laughter and the bowling alley, the restaurant, aviators, gold spray paint –

And he cuts that thought off before he can finish it, drives back to his little flat eight dollars lighter – for the ice cream he had to pay for after failing to catch up to Gavin – and with a promise that he can choose their next date spot.

He enters as quietly as he can, sharply aware of the late hour. Geoff’s asleep on a mattress, and Michael’s nowhere to be seen. At least, not inside. Ryan locks the door, grabs a soda, and heads to the balcony.

Michael’s there, all right, sipping a beer and looking out at the city. Ryan sinks down to sit next to him on the floor, cracking open his soda with a quiet _hiss_. Michael doesn’t react. They drink in silence for a few minutes.

“Did you have fun?” Michael asks. Ryan raises an eyebrow.

“Fun?”

“Geoff told me.”

“Ah.” Ryan huffs out a laugh. He’s not surprised.

“Not his fault. I asked.”

“Mm.”

Ryan doesn’t miss how Michael clinks his wedding ring against the beer bottle.

“I’m sorry,” Ryan says.

“It’s fine,” Michael says, too fast.

“Have you – seen her? Since – ”

Michael shakes his head.

“She’s under investigation,” he explains. “But she doesn’t know anything.”

“What does she think happened to you?”

“I left a note,” Michael says. “Said I had to go.”

Ryan nods. Michael takes a long drag of his beer.

“What are they like?” He asks, pinning Ryan with a look. “Your soulmates?”

“They’re nice,” Ryan answers, licking his lips.

“Were they worth it?”

Ryan stares down at his soda can.

“I like to think so,” he says.

Michael doesn’t reply for a long minute.

Ryan busies himself by looking out at the night sky through the balcony bars. It’s not quite a full moon yet.

“I’m glad you found them,” Michael says, with a soft sincerity to his voice that Ryan hasn’t heard in a while.

“Sorry you got mixed up in this,” Ryan says, with the same soft sincerity, but Michael shakes his head.

“Tell you what,” he says, glancing at Ryan with a hint of a smile on his face. “Get me another beer and I’ll forgive ya.”

Ryan ducks his head with a soft laugh and nods, plucking Michael’s empty bottle from his hands and standing. Michael may be unconventional, but Ryan knows that it’s more than a quip.

And although he never thought he would get it, he’s glad to have Michael’s forgiveness.


End file.
